My Top 1000 Songs #882: One More Colour
[I've been writing up my Top 1000 songs on a daily basis--you can see them all in descending order by hitting the All My Favorite Songs tag.]
Canadian singer-songwriter Jane Siberry's The Speckless Sky got a lot of airplay on the college station for a brief moment in 1985. There was something interestingly genre-hopping in her offbeat blend of Suzanne Vega's contemporary folk-pop, the arty new wave of fellow Torontonians Martha & The Muffins, and more experimental artists like Kate Bush and Laurie Anderson. The production makes it feel pretty dated, but single "One More Colour," which I spun the crap out of during my radio shows, holds up on the strength of its gorgeous melody. The tune has a new age vibe that should render it thoroughly passe, but whether it's the reliable nostalgia I feel every time I hear it, or just the undeniable beauty of that chorus, I still enjoy it immensely.
Original video:Brief cover from 1997 film The Sweet Hereafter:Rather insane cover from Rheostatics, which turns it into a hodge-podge of pop and prog and punk:
When I Googled "One More Colour" today, to check a lyric, up came your blog post, dated "1 day ago," and I just had to check it out because -- rather spookily, as Dame Edna would say! -- the same day you chose to write about this not-very-well-known song was the day I began arranging it for the Vancouver Men's Chorus to sing at their upcoming show, "Totally Awesome 80's"! I guess the universe has decided it's time for this noe 40-year-old song to make a comeback!
ReplyDeleteMusical synergy! You just can't keep a good song down; I'm sure it will sound amazing as a choral performance.
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